Posts Tagged ‘seeds’

It is an exciting moment when you see the very first seed unfurl! For Christmas this year I received a little mini hot house thingee and my very first seed is emerging. How cute it is! All that squirting was not wasted after all! I welcomed the first seed this morning with a few extra squirts! Can hardly wait for his brothers & sisters to pop up! I could get to like growing seeds!

baby figs, aren't they cute?

Further into my garden I notice the little baby figs growing very slowly into large yummy figs! Let us hope that my possum doesn’t like figs too much, maybe a bird net? Last year I attempted to grow eggplants. I had gotten quite good, if I say so myself at the tomatoes & decided to branch out so to speak. The eggplants grew rich and green and lush, all was well. I watered them every evening and I noticed they had beautiful purple, blue coloured flowers, how pretty. Unfortunately the possum thought they looked very tasty as well as pretty and ate every single one! I put out a bird net, but he just went under, over or through. I was a little upset but my children were relieved as they don’t like eggplants even when I hide them in the lasagne. ‘Has this got eggplant in it?’ they ask suspiciously before even eating any. Still, I am hopeful with the figs. So far, so good. Perhaps as autumn draws near you will find me eating figs, ricotta and honey. Bliss!

the tomato patch

Growing your own fruit and vegetables is certainly fun as well as good for you. It combines all the requirements for everyone living in these busy times. It gives you exercise as you dig and wheel the barrow full of compost. It brings relief from stress and somewhere cool and welcoming to spend time in, the garden, not the barrow of compost. As a bonus you get good food to eat or at least you can feel you are doing your bit to feed the wildlife.

I have been having heaps of fun over the last few months experimenting with cuttings. You don’t really need money to enjoy gardening. My cuttings have provided me with plants for free. Of course, visiting a nursery and buying plants there is fun too, but gardens do not have to be bought. They can be collected, with love and happiness, just as our mothers and their mothers did, way back in a chain that goes back thousands of years. In fact, even today, friendships are made through garden clubs and chats over fences where cuttings are exchanged. It is a great way to meet neighbours!

my cuttings growing well

Garden plants need not cost a lot or even anything at all if you grow it yourself. Start with a cutting or a seed and you have got a plant for nothing! I have a tiny nursery outside the back door. It is the place where I stick cuttings and seeds into pots, it is not tidy and neat but it is a place where I experiment and have fun. One of the best things about cuttings and seeds is that you can afford to experiment – if it drops dead it doesn’t really matter, you haven’t lost anything, but when it grows, it makes you feel really excited. I am always amazed and excited when the seeds I plant begin to shoot up.

If you use non hybrid seed then you can save the seed from the plants you grow to use again the next season. This is real old fashioned gardening at its best.